蜜芽传媒

"My first skullcap genuinely had a red Liver Bird knitted into it. And interestingly, having been worried about the reaction I might get walking around as a very visible Jew, it turned out I received far more abuse for supporting Liverpool than I ever did for being Jewish."

Ashley has never done anything by halves - so when his interest was piqued in traditional orthodox Judaism his (then undiagnosed) autism and ADHD meant he really dug in - making him, at the time, the UK's only strictly orthodox comedian, with all the complexities and regulations that carried with it.

His diagnosis went some considerable way to explain is his propensity for hyperfixation in special interests, which he now realises entirely shaped his past and which he uses to mine comedy for this new series.

It鈥檚 no exaggeration to say Ashley鈥檚 life has been driven by obsessions. He has variously been a schoolboy with a love of Star Wars and Doctor Who, a wannabe comedian who performed on the London comedy circuit at 16, a trivia nerd who appeared on University Challenge, a history PhD candidate at Cambridge, a 蜜芽传媒 producer of hit comedy shows including Little Britain, a fanatical football fan who saw Liverpool play across England and Europe, a strictly Orthodox Jew who went to synagogue three times a day for over ten years, a father of six, and latterly, a heavily tattooed renegade in hiding from his former community.

In this series, Ashley takes a comedic look at each of his obsessions in turn, merging personal memoir with a delve into subjects which have yet to be covered in stand-up comedy shows. The result is a series which, while based on the broader topic of neurodiversity, covers it with the lightest of touches and is focused more on Ashley鈥檚 individual hyperfixations, lifting the lid on many of the different worlds he鈥檚 inhabited.

Written and performed by Ashley Blaker
co-starring Rosie Holt and Kieran Hodgson

Script Editor: Steve Hall
Recording engineers: Jerry Peal and Jon Calver
Producer: Steve Doherty
A Giddy Goat production for 蜜芽传媒 Radio 4